Amd threadripper 2990wx vs intel core i9 7980xe

Tom's Hardware portal has tested the two most relevant consumer CPUs for 2, 000 euros: the new AMD Ryzen Threadripper 2990WX 32-core and the Intel Core i9 7980XE 18-core. These are the most powerful options from Intel and AMD. Today, based on its performance tests, we are going to show you a comparison of these two CPUs.

Index of contents

Comparing specifications

We will start with a comparative table of the specifications announced by both manufacturers. You can consult them both on the Intel ARK and AMD websites. Another good website to check its specifications is WikiChip.

	Intel Core i9 7980XE	AMD Ryzen Threadripper 2990WX
Cores	18	32
Threads	36	64
Base frequency	2.6GHz	3GHz
Turbo frequency	4.2GHz (4.4GHz Turbo Boost 3)	4.2GHz
L3 cache	24.75MB	64MB
TDP	165W	250W
Maximum RAM	128GB	1TB
Memory channels	4	4
ECC Support	Do not	Yes
Maximum LANES PCIe	44	60
Manufacturing process	14nm + Intel	12nm (14nm +) Global Foundries

Platform

To be able to support the 250W of the Threadripper 2990WX, we recommend either one of the new MSI or Gigabyte boards, or add a cooling kit offered by them to an ASUS ROG board (you have more information in this article).

We have only found prices for the MSI MEG X399 Creation, for about 490 euros, while the X299 plates range from € 210 to € 650.

At the platform level, we must recognize that AMD finds a great advantage and that is its ECC RAM memory support, which at Intel is relegated to the Xeon range of processors that has significantly higher prices. Certain types of professional users take this seriously and consider that ECC memories are necessary to do their job, especially if they are going to carry out important operations for hours, without interruption. We don't know how well the ECC implementation works in Threadripper 2, but being one of the features AMD is giving more publicity to, let's hope it works well. If you do not know what the ECC consists of, you can consult this article.

Another additional improvement in Threadripper processors is the number of PCIe lines, in its case 60, while the 7980XE will only be able to make use of 44. In both cases they are large numbers.

Refrigeration

Regarding cooling, the two main differences between Threadripper 2 and Skylake-X is that AMD uses an indium solder to join the die (in this case the die) and the IHS of the processor, which provides results Excellent thermal, Intel makes use of a thermal paste of questionable quality. This is why many users of Intel processors who want to extreme overclock perform the difficult “delid” process, where they extract the IHS and exchange the poor quality thermal paste for a liquid metal compound.

In case you do not know what we mean by solder / thermal paste between the die and the IHS, it is not the same as between the CPU and the heatsink, where thermal paste is always used and is something that the user does.

The IHS is the 'visible' part of the CPU, and inside is the die where all the magic happens. The metal plate that we see in the processor is a piece that serves to exchange heat, and between this piece and the die that contains the transistors there is a thermally conductive material. At AMD Ryzen, soldering. At current Intel, thermal paste. Welding is much better.

However, the added cores of the 2990WX bring its TDP up to 250W while the 7980XE remains at 165W. The TDP from Intel and AMD is not 100% comparable, but that's fine as a guideline. Going to the point, for both processors it is advisable to use good quality liquid cooling. Intel recommends this, and AMD believes that a good heatsink is sufficient. We are going to show you some of the best options for Intel and AMD, and in this case we make the distinction since the large size of the Threadripper CPUs makes it advisable to buy a specific cooling with a base that covers it entirely.

Heatsink for Intel 7980XE

Here you do not have to give special indications regarding the base, only the compatibility with socket 2066. So, there are an infinite number of options and it is not entirely fair to limit yourself to a few, but we still give you two quite popular recommendations.

be quiet! Dark Rock Pro 4, Processor, 1, Black Material: Copper; Fin Material: Aluminum; Type of support: Fluid dynamic bearing (FDB) 83, 27 EUR

If what you want is to go by air (for these CPUs we recommend liquid), the Be Quiet! Dark Rock Pro 4 is a relatively flashy and very powerful solution.

Corsair Hydro Series H115i Pro - Liquid CPU Cooler, 280mm Radiator, Dual ML Series 140mm PWM Fans, RGB Lighting, Supports Intel 115x / 2066 and AMD AM4, Black EUR 147.06

Regarding liquid cooling, a good reference is the Corsair H115i Pro, since at a reasonable price it offers great cooling capacity and adequate sound, in addition to a 5-year warranty.

Heatsink for AMD 2990WX

As a solution by air, our recommendation is the Noctua NH-U14S, of which we have a review. You should bear in mind that Noctua recommends installing a second fan to cool the 2990WX to have a greater margin with Turbo Boost, although it comes with one. We leave you the links for both:

No products found.

Regarding liquid cooling, it seems that Enermax has been the only one to dare to make one with a base that covers 100% Threadripper, so that is our recommendation, the Liqtech TR4 360.

If you are big AMD fans, you might like the Wraith Ripper ?

Performance tests: productivity and synthetic tests

We are going to compare the data provided by Tom's Hardware for its performance tests in 4 different productivity applications, which you can expand to other CPUs from the source. In this case we will compare 3 options: the Threadripper 2990WX with Precision Boost Overdrive, Threadripper 2990WX in stock and the i9-7980XE.

The PBO is an option that performs an automatic overclock of the processor based on the margin provided by the refrigeration used. That is, if there is scope to increase the clock frequency, it will increase it. It is reflected in Tom's Hardware tests separately.

More is better unless indicated by an asterisk	Cinebench R15 Multicore	7Zip Multicore Compression	7Zip Multicore Decompression	PCMark 8: Adobe Creative Cloud
TR 2990WX (PBO)	5840	41505	166872	5498
TR 2990WX	5175	40093	148957	4765
i9-7980XE	3363	72663	87697	4780

More is better unless indicated by an asterisk	POV-RAY Single core *	Cinebench R15 Single Core	POV-RAY Multi Core *	WebXPRT 2015 (HTML & Javascript)
TR 2990WX (PBO)	639	173	24	627
TR 2990WX	673	170	26	586
i9-7980XE	589	192	39	648

And we go on:

More is better unless indicated by an asterisk	Kraken Javascript Benchmark *	Handbrake x264 *	Render Ray Tracing (Corona 1.3) *	Handbrake x265 *
TR 2990WX (PBO)	869	466	36	1484
TR 2990WX	888	170	39	1534
i9-7980XE	843	192	54	1147

More is better unless indicated by an asterisk	And Cruncher Single Thread *	And Cruncher Multi Thread *	MotionMark 1.0 Browser bench	Blender
TR 2990WX (PBO)	654	37	242	12.81
TR 2990WX	666	39	237	14.55
i9-7980XE	355	42	337	21.23

Tom's Hardware portal indicates that the CPU Threadripper has certain problems in certain workloads that make use of AVX instructions, such as compression or Handbrake (x265), where the cores do not scale as well as the case of the Intel Core i9-7980XE e even from its brother, the Threadripper 2950WX, which at half the price gets closer to the 7980XE, giving Intel a victory in these specific applications with the special mention of the 2950X that is not in this comparison.

In other workloads that take advantage of the cores correctly, such as in Cinebench tests (rendered in Cinema 4D), the 2990WX excels with excellence. In the case of other applications that do not make use of many threads such as the Adobe Creative Cloud Suite, Intel offers an advantage, although in that specific test the difference is minimal. In synthetic tests where a single thread is used, the Intel advantage is usually clearer.

Threadripper 2990WX vs i9 7980XE gaming performance

Let's take a look at how these two processors perform in 8 quite diverse and important games. Again, we also take into account the measurement made with Precision Boost Overdrive activated.

Average FPS / 99th percentile	Civilization VI	Warhammer 40K	GTA V	Hitman (2016)
TR 2990WX (PBO)	94.8 / 74.9	105.0 / 72.3	93.6 / 65.4	118.1 / 76.6
TR 2990WX	87.2 / 68.5	94.3 / 63.5	83.1 / 59.2	112.5 / 69.0
i9-7980XE	108.1 / 75.7	100.0 / 67.1	94.9 / 64.5	130.1 / 82.0

Average FPS / 99th percentile	Project Cars 2	AotS: Escalation	Far Cry 5	Middle Earth: Shadow of war
TR 2990WX (PBO)	103.4 / 66.8	44.6 / 34.6	100.4 / 84.2	96.9 / 75.8
TR 2990WX	97.2 / 63.4	41.0 / 34.7	95.0 / 78.6	94.9 / 73.0
i9-7980XE	104.8 / 73.0	49.8 / 33.5	102.3 / 82.7	91.5 / 66.2

The i9 is the clear winner here, although the Precision Boost Overdrive was helpful in these tests so users with advanced solutions like TR4-exclusive liquid coolers could see much better performance. It should be remembered that neither of these two CPUs is especially suitable for gaming, since it is very likely that both the Socket 1151 and the AM4 offer a better price / performance ratio, and in many cases (especially 1151) better performance than both processors.

So, if at first your main objective is to play, it could be said that it is more important to buy a 'normal' domestic range processor such as the Ryzen 7 2700X or the future Intel Core i9-9900K. The latter will probably offer you (at the time of writing this has not been released yet) a brutal performance in games thanks to its high frequencies, without preventing you from performing tasks that require great multi-core power such as streaming. You could invest the surplus in a better graphics card, more RAM, balance cooling / box / source, better peripherals, etc.

In any case, surely if you are evaluating the purchase of these two processors it is because productivity is extremely relevant to you. So, our recommendation is that you give much more importance to the previous tests than to the games, both processors are used to take a few games.

Value for money, final words and conclusion

In this comparison there is no clear winner, since both the Intel Core i9 7980XE and the AMD Ryzen Threadripper 2990WX offer excellent performance with certain strengths and weaknesses. In this regard, the decision must be made by the user himself, considering which option best meets his needs and the programs he will use.

We recommend reading the best processors on the market

Perhaps the biggest advantage of the Threadripper platform is the ECC, which for some of the users is somewhat irrelevant since they will use normal DDR4 memories, but for others it may tip the balance. In the case of Intel, although it has a much lower number of cores, many users will base a good part of their productivity on applications that make use of few threads or even one, in which case Intel is victorious. However, that also leads us to ask ourselves if a CPU is really worth it as well if we are going to use tasks that make use of few cores, since although we use all kinds of processor applications such as the 8-core i9-9900K and 16 threads are on the decline, and will offer superior mono-core performance with a respectable multi-core at a much lower price. It is, ultimately, a matter of priorities.

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